So I’m in India, back in a civilization where reincarnation is accepted as an obvious fact of nature. I’m sitting in a Tibetan
Buddhist meditation center when reincarnation logistics cross my mind.
We have had an explosion of human population in the last hundred years and simultaneously massive death tolls of the world’s animals. That means a lot of animal souls that need somewhere to go and a lot of human bodies that need to be filled.
Does it not seem likely that we would have a lot of human first-timers alive today? When human population was more stable, as it was throughout almost all of history, souls could keep reincarnating again and again in the human form to continue mastering human lessons. This would probably make for wise, balanced, and virtuous societies. But we live in a different world today.
Let’s use livestock as an example of how we manage the spiritual realm in modern society. We live in an age where we annually slaughter millions of factory farmed pigs and cows (rather sophisticated animals not so far from humans on the spiritual ladder). Humans are typically the only other species these animals are seeing so they likely have humans, slaughter, and stress on their minds before their miserable deaths which might bring them into that sort of existence in their reincarnation. (The belief is that the focus of consciousness at death determines the situation of rebirth.)
Or we can look at our pets. Cats and dogs are quite high on the spiritual ladder too – think about dogs’ tendency towards hierarchy and their ability to love. They live in our manufactured society, but are locked alone in our homes all day. We may think we are doting pet lovers, but quite often we deprive our pets of natural environments and healthy lifestyles and use them as objects of our egos and entertainment, keeping them like prisoners in our plasticy lives. How many people are born into this sort of reality in the present day?
Everything is energy. Energy can’t be created or destroyed which means it needs to come from and go somewhere. The energy for new life must come from somewhere and the energy of dying creatures must go somewhere. Nature’s tendency towards homeostasis (aka the law of attraction) makes the idea of reincarnation seem quiet logical.
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| Jane Goodall offers a spectacular example of how to connect with animals. |
As souls living in these powerful human lives, we should really consider how we are managing our spiritual economics and make decisions to help end the suffering of all souls.
